Beyond the end zone
Arizona boasts beauty that’s hard to compare and offers an amazing array of one-of-a-kind experiences
PHOENIX, ARIZ.— Last weekend, the eyes of many were on Arizona, on the field at the University of Phoenix Stadium, where Super Bowl XLIX unfolded. Now they have a chance to look beyond the end zone and discover an amazing state characterized by incredible diversity in its landscape, culture and attractions.
Which should hardly be surprising given Arizona’s sheer immensity. Arizona is the sixth largest state in the Union.
Without even crossing state lines, you can visit a “Wonder of the World,” traverse two deserts, stop at a Frank Lloyd Wright enclave, cringe at the sound of gunfire during the shootout at the OK Corral, drive Route 66 and gaze at mountains that could hold their own in Banff. Arizona has it all. You can spend a day negotiating the switchback turns and scrub-infested hills of Apache Trail, an erstwhile stagecoach route, where Saguaro cactus are scattered across the slopes like tombstones. You can also visit Goldfield Ghost Town, a mining town from around 1893 at the base of Superstition Mountain, pan for gold, take a train ride, hit the Mammoth Saloon and meet the local “sheriff,” a man with twin pistols and a white Stetson.
You can pull up a seat at the edge of the desert at Rawhide Western Town and Steakhouse in Wild Horse Pass, south of Phoenix. Here, you can face a backdrop that could hold its own in a Clint Eastwood movie, inhale the smell of gunpowder and see the blue haze of gunfire backlit by the setting sun as an outlaw is shot and falls to the street from the roof of the livery stable in a puff of dust.
Then you can dine on rattlesnake washed down with sarsaparilla.
Arizona’s allure isn’t just about the Old West.
Visit an oasis of culture at Taliesin West. This retreat, nestled at the edge of the Sonoran Desert in Scottsdale, was designed and built by Frank Lloyd Wright, was his winter home from 1937 until his death and serves as the main campus of his school of architecture.
The design is understated, quintessential Wright. Local wooden beams are punctuated by natural stone balustrades.
Geometric shapes mirror the outlines of the mountains towering overhead. The garden room is an oasis of desert sunlight.
Further north, discover a truly spiritual oasis. Have a picnic near Sedona, in the shadow of towering striated hoodoos and sky-reaching landforms that look like gigantic statues, fire-engine red and battleship grey, monstrosities that change in the sunlight with each passing moment.
Climb a hill to the Chapel of the Holy Cross — sleek lines joining earth and heaven — designed as though man and nature are fused as partners in overwhelming beauty.
Stroll Sedona, a cross between Lourdes and Niagara Falls. Glitz and beauty crowd each other. One store sells cowboy hats, while another establishment offers sunrise yoga lessons and quartz talismans.
Commerce and tourism live together beneath surreal and awe-inspiring landforms, gigantic pillars topped by oval shapes formed by the wind, the rock changes from pumpkin-coloured to scarlet as the sun moves across the sky.
Ascend Oak Creek Canyon and ne- gotiate hairpin turns and drops of 300 metres, slide by jagged ridges, stare at pines scrabbling on precipitous slopes, wend your way through bends in the road that would be breathtakingly beautiful if they were not even more breathtakingly terrifying.
Continue your journey through the pine forests and white-capped mountains near Flagstaff, the woods as green as the desert was brown.
In Williams, you can visit a diner that in the 1930s was a gas station fronting one of the last stretches of Route 66 and feast on burgers as big as dinner plates as you are serenaded by piped-in Elvis tunes beside gas pumps lining the walls.
And you still haven’t experienced the Grand Canyon. You haven’t yet visited Lake Havasu, a surreal glittering body of blue water in the middle of the desert. Nor have you marvelled at the monstrosity of the Hoover Dam.
You’ve only scratched the surface of Arizona’s amazing diversity.
In winter, you can schuss down one of the 40 runs at Flagstaff’s Arizona Snowbowl ski resort.
In spring or fall, you can hike the Grand Canyon to an ancient native American village, through a petrified forest. Or go whitewater rafting on the Colorado River.
Or you can play a round of golf. There are more than 300 courses here, from We-Ko-Pa at the edge of the Sonoran Desert, near Scottsdale, to the 200-metre drives at Apache Stronghold.
Now that the football game is over, people can look beyond the end zone and discover Arizona. To see more stories by freelance writer Mark Stevens, visit travelwriteclick.com